Scientific Resources

The NICHD supports and contributes to a variety of resources and tools that researchers and scientists can use in their work. These resources include, but are not limited to, tissue banks and repositories, datasets and databases, model organisms, genome and DNA sequences, and resource libraries.

BECON: The Bioengineering ConsortiumBECON is the focus of bioengineering activities at the NIH. The Consortium consists of senior-level representatives from all of the NIH Institutes, Centers, and Divisions, plus representatives from other federal agencies concerned with biomedical research and development.

Bioengineering and Information Science Technology InitiativeThe focus of biomedical computing activities at the NIH is the BISTI Consortium (BISTIC), which consists of senior-level representatives from each NIH Institute and Center, plus representatives from other federal agencies concerned with biocomputing. The BISTI site includes information about BISTI symposia and funding opportunities in bioinformatics.

Center for Inherited Disease Research (CIDR)CIDR provides high-quality next-generation sequencing and genotyping services, as well as statistical genetics consultation, to investigators working to discover genes that contribute to common disease.

Center for Research in Reproduction Ligand Assay and Analysis CoreThis Core at the University of Virginia employs state-of-the-art methods to quantitate peptide and steroid reproductive hormones in blood and tissue. It also develops new methodology, prepares labeled reagents for immunoassays, immunocytochemistry and binding studies and assists in the transfer of technology to participating investigators.

Cincinnati Magnetic Resonance Imaging of Neurodevelopment (C-Mind) ProjectThis project aims to create standardized methods for recruiting, scanning, and processing data using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) coupled with arterial spin labeling perfusion and to investigate language development and attention brain processes of typically developing children using task fMRI. Software, manuals, raw and processed data will be available to the scientific community. The C-Mind Project is led by the Pediatric Neuroimaging Research Consortium at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, in collaboration with the laboratory of Neuroimaging at the University of California, Los Angeles, and is funded through an NICHD contract.

Clinical and Translational Science Awards (CTSA)A national consortium of medical research institutions, funded through Clinical and Translational Science Awards (CTSA), is working together to improve the way biomedical research is conducted nationwide. Consortium members share a common vision to reduce the time it takes for laboratory discoveries to become treatments for patients, to engage communities in clinical research efforts and to train clinical and translational researchers.

Cochrane Neonatal Collaborative ReviewsAn effort to relay technical and research information to health care providers, researchers, and interested publics. These reviews provide efficient access to current evidence in neonatology and help to reduce the gap between the time when a treatment's effectiveness and safety is established in research and its routine use by health care providers.

DS Connect™: The Down Syndrome RegistryThis patient registry is a secure, Web-based national resource for storing and sharing demographic and health information about individuals with Down syndrome. The Registry will help identify those people with Down syndrome who might be eligible to take part in research studies or clinical trials and connect them with the researchers leading those studies.

Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Office of Pediatric TherapeuticsThe Office of Pediatric Therapeutics works with the NICHD, the NIH, the World Health Organization and other international groups, academia, and professional and advocacy organizations to analyze pediatric trials, identify ethical and safety issues, and publish and disseminate data and results.

Foreign Grants InformationThis Web site, maintained by the NIH Office of Extramural Research, provides a central location for information related to those elements of the grants process specific to foreign applicants and grantees.

Health Services Research (HSR) Information Central (National Library of Medicine)The National Library of Medicine maintains this portal for the HSR community and includes resources from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, the National Cancer Institute, and the Health Services Research and Development Service at the Veterans Administration, among others. The portal also provides access to evidence-based practice and health technology assessments, information on meetings and conferences, and resources on grants, funding, and fellowships for those working in the HSR community.

Interagency Coordinating Committee on Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (ICCFAS )The objectives of the ICCFAS are to exchange information and to coordinate federal strategies and programs in an effort to more effectively address FAS/ARND on a national level. The Committee promotes and facilitates the development of projects within member organizations and collaborative projects and cooperative programs between member agencies.

International HapMap ProjectThe elucidation of the entire human genome has made possible this current effort to develop a haplotype map of the human genome. The haplotype map, or "HapMap," will be a tool that will allow researchers to find genes and genetic variations that affect health and disease.

National Database for Autism Research (NDAR)NDAR is an informatics platform for Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASDs) and includes relevant data at all levels of biological and behavioral organization (i.e., molecules, genes, neural tissues, social and environmental interactions) and for all data types (i.e., text, numeric, image, time series, etc.). NDAR was developed to share data across the entire ASD field and to facilitate collaboration across laboratories and interconnectivity with other platforms.

National Gene Vector Laboratories (NGVL)The NGVL are composed of an interactive group of academic production and pharm/tox labs whose primary goal is to provide clinical grade vectors for phase I/II gene therapy clinical trials and to provide support for relevant pharmacology/toxicology data leading up to clinical gene transfer protocols.

Neuroscience@NIHThis inter-Institute effort seeks to convey, on an NIH-wide basis, research being conducted and supported in the neurosciences.

Neuroscience Research Support at the NICHDThe NICHD is committed to supporting research in the neurosciences, particularly as they affect developing systems and rehabilitation. This site provides a central location for the Institute's extramural neuroscience research information.

NIH Neuroscience BlueprintThe Blueprint is a framework to enhance cooperative activities among 15 NIH Institutes and Centers that support research on the nervous system. By pooling resources and expertise, the Blueprint can take advantage of economies of scale, confront challenges too large for any single Institute or Center, and develop research tools and infrastructure that will serve the entire neuroscience community.

NIH Common FundDeveloped with input from meetings with more than 300 nationally recognized leaders in academia, industry, government, and the public, the NIH Common Fund provides a framework of the priorities NIH as a whole must address in order to optimize its entire research portfolio. The NIH Common Fund identifies the most compelling opportunities in three main areas: new pathways to discovery, research teams of the future, and re-engineering the clinical research enterprise.

Reproductive Genomics Program: Mouse Models of InfertilityThis program, at the Jackson Laboratory, uses ENU mutagenesis to produce mouse models of infertility and includes mutagenesis of the mouse genome, phenotypic screening for infertility mutations, and regional mapping of each mutation to a chromosome. Breeding stock is available for scientists interested in using these models in their own research programs.

Trans-NIH Structural Birth Defects Working Group (SBDWG)
The Trans-NIH SBDWG comprises extramural program officials from NIH components whose missions include research into structural birth defects, with the ultimate goal of facilitating advances in our understanding of the etiology, mechanisms, epidemiology, prevention, and treatment of structural birth defects.

Xenopus Gene Collection (XGC)The XGC supports the production of cDNA libraries, clones, and sequences to provide a set of full-length, open reading frame sequences and cDNA clones of expressed genes for Xenopus. All resources are publicly available for the biomedical scientific community.

Zebrafish Gene Collection (ZGC)The ZGC supports the production of cDNA libraries, clones, and sequences to provide a set of full-length, open reading frame sequences and cDNA clones of expressed genes for zebrafish. All resources are publicly available for the biomedical scientific community.